Tuesday, April 05, 2016

Remaining Jews 'cannot stand' Yemen anymore

Constant harassment has persuaded the remaining Jews of Yemen to think about joining the 19 Jews airlifted to Israel, together with a Torah scroll, in a much-publicised operation a few weeks ago. The remaining Jews, in Raydah in the north and a compound in the capital Sana'a, deny that two people were arrested in retribution for the smuggling of the scroll. The Media Line, via the Jerusalem Post, reports:

Final group of Yemenite Jewish immigrants arrives in Israel.
(photo: Arielle Di-Porto for the Jewish Agency for Israel)

SANA'A - The 67 Yemeni Jews who refused to join the recent secret
airlift to Israel organized by the Jewish Agency are now seeking to
follow suit. Sources in Yemen report that the group, comprised mostly of
children and the elderly and located in the capital Sana’a and in the
neighboring province of Amran in the city of Raydah, has been subject to
constant harassment because most of their friends, neighbors, and
community elders have left for Israel.

Speaking to The Media
Line on condition of anonymity because of the fear of reprisals by
Muslim Yemeni, one of those now trying to leave said the remaining Jews
complain that in addition to increasing abuse by Muslims, there is no
one to lead their religious rituals or to teach their children.

Those
who remained behind have confirmed reports that the spate of publicity
accompanying the mini-exodus and showcasing the 600-800 year old Torah
scroll that the emigrants took with them has effectively drawn targets
on the backs of those who opted out of the airlift. “The Jewish
Agency’s decision to release the news about the manuscript arriving in
Israel caused us even more seclusion. In Raydah, they treat us like
strangers, even though we are Yemenis just like them. Our religion,
which is different from theirs, has caused them to look at us with
inferiority. They have fenced our houses in with stones and cut off the
roads leading to our homes so that we do not escape or to make it
difficult for us to get food or any other supplies we need into our
homes,” he explained.

“After the news about the manuscript became public, people
became very wary of us, accusing us of treason against our country,
Yemen. Now they are always watching us. We cannot stand to live here
anymore.”

In Raydah, most Jewish rituals used to be carried out
in a small church built of cement blocks with barely enough room for 10
men, the required quota for Jewish communal prayer. In the middle this
church is a black cloth with Hebrew writing where rituals used to be
performed and celebrations conducted including prayers on Passover and
other holidays; and circumcisions, all led by Rabbi Suleiman Bin Yaqoub.
“

Although The Media Line was told that since the airlift and
the rabbi’s departure the fear is that all Jewish rituals will become
extinct in Yemen, it’s still possible to travel to Sana’a where a rabbi
remains and the situation is not as bleak.

In fact, not everyone
who chose not to board the Jewish Agency flight did so out of fear. For
some, it was an economic decision. Saeed Al-Natehi and his wife Muzal
Bint Uda, were unable to sell their home, a three-story structure with a
large yard enclosed by a stone fence and an asking price of about
$320,000 where they live with their three daughters, a son and two
grandchildren.

Muzal says they will join the others as soon as
their home is sold – which should not be long. Muzal notes that she and
Saeed have received offers from their Muslim neighbors.

Muzal also expresses her love for Yemen, but concludes that, “currently the best solution is to leave.”

In
sharp distinction to Rayda’s Jews, those in Sana’a were close-mouthed,
refusing to discuss their situation or reasons for not having left for
Israel when approached by The Media Line. Of those who did offer
comments, one Sana’a resident said the silence is due to “security
reasons” while another said that he cannot afford to buy a ticket to
leave. That, however, seems unlikely given the Israeli government’s
commitment to relocate Yemen’s remaining Jews.

It comes as a
surprise to many that Jews are not officially prohibited from leaving
Yemen. Khalid Al-Shaif, chief of Sana’a’s International Airport, told
The Media Line that, Jews are free to leave the country and there is
nothing stopping them. He explained that, “They are Yemenis, who are
subject to the same rules as other citizens. We check their bags, and
see their exit and entrance visas. Being Yemenis, we treat them as such;
there is no religion-based bias at all,” said Al-Shaif.

Trudy, you are not in their situation and they do not have access to information as you do. Their sources of information are limited. And their social situation, living in the midst of an Arab civil war, is not something that you have experienced, I take it.

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Introduction

In just 50 years, almost a million Jews, whose communities stretch back up to 3,000 years, have been 'ethnically cleansed' from 10 Arab countries. These refugees outnumber the Palestinian refugees two to one, but their narrative has all but been ignored. Unlike Palestinian refugees, they fled not war, but systematic persecution. Seen in this light, Israel, where some 50 percent of the Jewish population descend from these refugees and are now full citizens, is the legitimate expression of the self-determination of an oppressed indigenous, Middle Eastern people.This website is dedicated to preserving the memory of the near-extinct Jewish communities, which can never return to what and where they once were - even if they wanted to. It will attempt to pass on the stories of the Jewish refugees and their current struggle for recognition and restitution. Awareness of the injustice done to these Jews can only advance the cause of peace and reconciliation.(Iran: once an ally of Israel, the Islamic Republic of Iran is now an implacable enemy and numbers of Iranian Jews have fallen drastically from 80,000 to 20,000 since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Their plight - and that of all other communities threatened by Islamism - does therefore fall within the scope of this blog.)